[Andalusi Studies] New Book: Medieval Arabic Music and Musicians: Three Translated Texts

[Dwight Reynolds]

Greetings to all and my best wishes to everyone for a peaceful and healthy
New Year!

(Apologies for any cross-posting)

I'm happy to announce the publication of *Medieval Arab Music and
Musicians: Three Translated Texts *(E.J. Brill) which appeared this week.

https://brill.com/view/title/61295?rskey=C2NBwB&result=1

The volume includes complete, annotated translations (each with a
substantial introduction) to three of the most important texts about
medieval Arab music and poetry.  This volume may be of particular interest
to scholars of al-Andalus since it includes both a translation of Ibn
Hayyan's biography of Ziryab and a translation of Ibn Sana' al-Mulk's
treatise on the muwashshah, *Dar al-Tiraz.*

The first text is the lengthy biography of Ibrahim al-Mawsili from
al-Isbahani's *Kitab al-Aghani.  *Remarkably enough, although scholars have
translated biographies of some of the poets from KA, it appears that no one
has ever translated a complete biography of any of the musicians.  In
addition, very few translations from KA have included full integral
sections, rather than selected passages, so this translation also offers an
opportunity to see the hand of the author at work, how he has organized the
materials, the conflicting accounts of various events, and so forth.
Ibrahim al-Mawsili led a remarkably adventuresome life, so I hope that some
will find this "a jolly good read," filled with accounts of the inner
workings of the court of Harun al-Rashid, rivalry, love affairs,
imprisonment and brutal punishments, a few tales of the supernatural, as
well as nights spent drinking and singing in taverns, and Ibrahim's
eventual rise to fame and  triumph. And, of course, Ibrahim was --
according to Ibn Abd Rabbih -- the teacher of Ziryab.

The second text is the biography of the legendary musician Ziryab, whose
fame and repute has grown remarkably over the centuries.  This 11th-century
account, from Ibn Hayyan's *Kitab al-Muqtabis, *is the single largest
account of this remarkable figure, and was compiled from multiple sources
dating from the 9th to 11th centuries.  This is the account that al-Maqqari
used as the basis for his famous 17th-century biography of Ziryab in *Nafh
al-Tib*, which we can now see was heavily redacted and bowdlerized.  This
text offers a sense of how Ziryab was viewed in medieval al-Andalus and
offers a corrective to more recent, nearly hagiographic, accounts of his
life.

The final text is a translation of the 12th-century treatise *Dar al-Tiraz*
by Ibn Sana' al-Mulk, the earliest and most complete medieval work on
*muwashshah
*poetry and song.  Those interested in the early history of the *muwashshah*
may find the introduction rather provocative, for it argues that key
elements of this text have been misinterpreted in the past due to a lack of
understanding of how the author used certain technical terms in his
arguments.

Many thanks,
Dwight

******************************************************************
Dwight F. Reynolds, Professor
Arabic Language &  Literature
Department of Religious Studies
University of California, Santa Barbara
<dreynold at ucsb.edu>
******************************************************************
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